6 Wordpress Plugins You Want But Don't Know It

In optimizing this blog, it turned out that there are all these great features you can add to your existing Wordpress site that can make the experience better for you and your users. You can add your favorite aspects of larger sites without much programming experience. Here are some of the ones that I found useful:

1. AJAXed Wordpress

AJAX is one of the most important technologies of the Web 2.0 revolution. It enables you to use a web interface without reloads or clunky software plug-ins like Java or Flash. This plug-in gives your blog powerful AJAX features. You can choose and customize the features to your blog's design. The in-line commenting system lets your users comment right from the homepage. They can even preview comments formatted using your CSS before posting. It's as seamless as you need it to be.

2. WP-OpenID

This plug-in gives your users a log-in without any registration! With then power of the OpenID standard, you can have users sign in using a Yahoo, Livejournal or Google (Blogger) account. They probably have an OpenID account without even knowing it. It's very simple to make your blog OpenID accessible. I haven't yet worked out the details of making OpenID play well with the AJAXed WP, but I've come up with a reasonable compromise by using them both in different situations.

3. Batch Categories

This plug-in helps you manage your post categories easily. It's a time saver in so many different situations. It will help you put your content right where your readers will expect it.

4. Broken Link Checker

Find and fix those broken links in your posts. I came across this plug-in after seeing so many daunting 404 errors in my site logs. This thing made it easier to find many of them and correct the problems. You'll want your old articles to be readable and as useful as possible!

5. Hot Linked Image Cacher

Similar to the last plug-in, this one goes through and finds images hosted outside of your site. Then it copies them over to your server. This will prevent missing images down the line.

6. Sociable

This puts icons for various social networks onto your posts. You can choose from tons of different services to feature.

This article is a follow-up to “Wordpress Design Spice Up Tips�

Wordpress Design Spice Up Tips

Everyone wants to present their content with a great design. Wordpress makes it easy to update content and make it look great. It takes as much or as little effort as you want to put into it. Try one or more of these tips and see what happens!

Don't forget!

You will have to apply everything you know about basic design principles. Great design is about putting things together in a way that makes sense. Organize the visual information. Never be afraid to re-read the basic design principles and look at your work critically no matter what your level is.

Make your own theme

The completely unstyled Basic 1.0 Wordpress Theme

Wordpress has themes and you could just download a ton of freely available already made themes. If you're daring enough or already have some HTML or CSS knowledge, I'd suggest make you go forward and make your own theme. Starting out with a completely unstyled theme like basic 1.0, you can develop your own design with your own branding. The theme that comes with Wordpress has too much of its own design elements that can creep into your site. Ultimately it's worth it if you want to have control over your site.

The web is dynamic, so keep adjusting your theme to make it look better and better over time. Consider design problems and solutions, don't do things just because they are "cool". Think in terms of interest and focus.

Design your category pages

Create or edit the category template to make it a site of its own! For people looking for topical information, your category pages can become information hubs. Suddenly you have a whole miniblog all about art or tv. This is a great chance to make a new entry point for your site that you may not have thought about before.

Your first stop should be the Category Template documentation. By default, the most basic design is just a boring listing out the categories in the same way as your date archives. Instead, create a category.php file that looks like a main index page design. The documentation also tells you how you can hand code a template for each category if you wish! Suddenly you can have a new site populated with your own blog's content.

Read about adding images and text in Performancing's Make Your Wordpress Category Pages More Interesting. That page has some great tips including adding category images and editorial content.

Style your comments

You can create style that helps you address your readers. Take a look at these tips for professional looking commenting

Enable OpenID

Wordpress OpenID Login

I know this isn't really a design thing, but the OpenID is a usability element you might want to take a look at. The OpenId Plug-in is a quick install that lets your commenters log in with their open id url. You also may want to look into using your blog url as your openid. Using both of these methods together, you can login to Wordpress itself with OpenID.